As a critic who has been watching the Arizona Coyotes closely over the past two seasons, I think they need to fire their head coach, Rick Tocchet. Tocchet was named the head coach of the Arizona Coyotes on July 11, 2017 and has led Arizona to the playoffs in one of three seasons thus far. On the surface, that sounds solid, but if it weren’t for the pandemic, Arizona would’ve missed the playoffs altogether.
Starting off with his first season as head coach in 2017-18, one thing that immediately comes to mind was the historically terrible start. The Arizona Coyotes recorded just one win all of October 2017, that coming on October 30th against the Flyers in overtime. The team finished 1-11-1 in the month of October for only three points and one of, if not the worst, start in NHL history.
Many point out that Arizona played much better during the second half of the season, but I find it hard to be impressed with just one single winning month throughout the season. That month being March 2018, where Arizona went 10-6-1 after they were long eliminated from the postseason and every team went into their matchups seeing it as an easy win. You’re going to win at least some of those games.
They did play better yes, but looking more closely, it’s not as impressive as fans of the team like me wish it were. One more thing to note was the fact Arizona started five different goaltenders throughout the 2017-18 regular season. Arizona finished with a record of 29-41-12, last in their division, as well as posting a -48 goal differential.
Moving onto the 2018-19 season, there were improvements. The team would finish with a 39-35-8 record, still a losing record, but much better than the season prior. In fact, Arizona only missed out on the second wild card spot by four points.
Looks better on the surface, but looking a little bit deeper and you’ll find the many problems. The first thing of note is the fact that Arizona did clean up that goal differential, only a -10 this time around. Though they would only score three or more goals in 37 out of 82 games.
Scoring three or more a game in just 45 percent of your games is not a winning formula in this league. Glancing at a division rival, the Vegas Golden Knights, they finished just above the Coyotes with a 43-32-7 record, a +19 goal differential and scored three or more goals in 42 games. Though the difference is small, it’s the little things that are the difference between success and failure.
The results support one thing I noticed while watching the team closely throughout the season: goal scoring doesn’t flourish in Tocchet’s system. It’s no secret that his system is defence above all else, which explains why his Coyotes teams can’t consistently score. During the games, Arizona would score three or more goals and would usually also surrender more than usual.
That seemingly proves my theory that Arizona would score despite Tocchet and not because of him. One last example that extends that point is the team’s leading scorer, Alex Galchenyuk. Galchenyuk missed ten games due to injury, was bounced all around the lineup constantly, including many games played in the bottom-six and he still scored nineteen goals. This was enough to share the team lead with the legend himself, Brad Richardson.
Add on top of all of that the fact that Rick Tocchet endorses players playing through injuries. During exit interviews, it was revealed that Coyotes centreman Derek Stepan was playing with a knee brace. On March 1, 2019, it was announced that Stepan would miss 4-6 weeks with while sidelined with a lower-body injury.
Then, just three weeks later, on March 23rd, the forward was suddenly back in the lineup. He would play all of Arizona’s final eight games and didn’t look particularly good for the first four of those. He didn’t look ready and even confirmed he was just playing through pain, but two goals and one assist was worth it.
Then we can take a look at Antti Raanta, who was injured after a game against the Carolina Hurricanes. This was on November 2nd, 2018. He missed about three weeks of ice time and returned against Colorado on November 23rd. Raanta didn’t look quite right, but did manage an impressive 34 saves.
Though he would give up five goals in that same game, Raanta still played well enough, so he’s fine. During the next game against the Calgary Flames, Raanta would surrender six goals on 26 shots before being pulled for the third period. Once again, he didn’t look very good, but he’s fine.
Finally, against Minnesota on November 27th, Raanta allowed three goals against the Wild in 40 minutes and left the game with an injury. He would miss the remainder of the season. The “three strikes and you’re out” policy extends to hockey, I suppose.
Finally, there’s the Darcy Kuemper story. Kuemper missed part of the season with his own injuries, but the team’s come above all else, despite having Calvin Pickard on the roster to, at least, play a game or two. Darcy Kuemper played in 22 consecutive games, including two back-to-back situations between February 19th and April 4th, 2020.
Despite Arizona being eliminated from the playoffs, Tocchet was still going to start Kuemper against the Jets to close out the season. That was until Kuemper requested that he let Calvin Pickard play. Kuemper is a nice enough guy that I do believe that he wanted to give Pickard a chance to keep his NHL career going, but I also equally believe that his back was destroyed by attempting to single-handedly carry Arizona to the playoffs.
It’s clear that Tocchet cares not about the human cost that must be paid to fund his desperate attempt to look successful.
Finally, we come to Tocchet’s ultimate failure, the 2019-20 NHL season. Once again, on the surface, I can see the “success.” Arizona not only won their first playoff series in eight years, but officially qualified for the playoffs for the first time in those eight years. Then you apply the necessary context, and yeah, not anywhere near as good as I’d love to believe it is.
First off, this team had top tier talent in Phil Kessel and Taylor Hall, were first in their division, had both Kuemper and Raanta playing well despite injury and finally had their first 20 goal scorer since Keller’s unrealistically elite rookie season. Add all of that up and Arizona still went 11-13-4 during the second half of the pandemic shortened season. They were mediocrity incarnate and that’s saying something from a fan of the Arizona Diamondbacks, who were described as one of the most mediocre teams in MLB history in 2019.
If it weren’t for the NHL’s play-in round system, Arizona never makes the playoffs this year. A team with a young and exciting core, a franchise goaltender, a really good back-up, a two-time Stanley Cup champion playing under a coach that coached him through some of the best years of his career, as well as a former Hart Trophy winner would’ve missed the playoffs if it weren’t for a plague. Arizona would go on to be dominated by the Avalanche in five games and lost the final two games by a score of 7-1.
One last point I’d like to get across is the fact that since Tocchet became Arizona’s head coach, the Coyotes have had just two 20 goal scorers, as well as two 50 point scorers. Keller scored 23 goals and 65 points in 2017-18, Derek Stepan recorded 56 points, and this season, Conor Garland scored 22 goals. Compare this to Vegas once more, Vegas had five 20 or more goal scorers in 17-18, 18-19 and four in 19-20.
This is in addition to five, four and three 50 or more point scorers over their first three seasons in the league. Add in the fact that Arizona has never registered a true winning record under Tocchet and I think it’s clear that he’s a terrible coach that needs to be fired for the betterment of the team.